


windsor castle

by novoaa1



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, F/F, Fluff, Middle Ages, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, POV Wanda Maximoff, Protective Natasha Romanov, Soft bitches being soft, Vampire Natasha Romanoff, but like i only have so much time ok, cause like, lady in waiting wanda maximoff, look i did some googling, set in the late middle ages, why not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22082086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/novoaa1/pseuds/novoaa1
Summary: “You are hungry,” Wanda reasons, attempting a different method—one that appeals to logic rather than emotion—in order to sway the stubborn princess. "You need blood, that which I have in abundance. I beg of you, Natasha—allow me this.”Natasha worries her lower lip between her teeth, a stormy look upon her exalted features. “Allow you the chance to die by my hand?”“You have far too little faith in yourself, Natasha.”“And you have far too much.”
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Wanda Maximoff, Pietro Maximoff & Wanda Maximoff, Wanda Maximoff/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 7
Kudos: 101





	windsor castle

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lifeisawaffle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifeisawaffle/gifts).



> ok ummm so again, i dont know much about the late middle ages and i am noT a history person (i actually sucked BALLS at it but thats neither here nor there) so i did like 30min of research or something but i know it's not all gonna be accurate
> 
> so let's just pretend there's no blatant inaccuracies here ok? ok
> 
> also um. proofreading is a feat which most constantly eludes my lazy ass but i promsie i'll be back to proofread it like... at some point

Serving at Windsor Castle was… peculiar, amongst many things. 

Wanda found she did not quite mind the queerness of it, however, for her calling as Lady-in-Waiting to Princess Natasha seldom proved unpleasant, in any sense of the word. Merely… strange, on occasion.

(In Wanda’s humbled opinion, England could perhaps benefit from a morsel—or two—of ‘strange.’)

Black death had only just begun to sweep the lands, a seeming all-powerful infirmity sent from the depths of Hades to bestow utter ruination upon Europe and its settlers. 

Even mutants (or ‘deviants,’ as King Edward III of England, Princess Natasha’s ill-tempered father, had so pompously dubbed them) such as herself remained the farthest thing from immune—Wanda’s late brother Pietro could attest to that. 

(Oftentimes, late in the evening, she will ponder upon the brother she lost—upon what could have been.

Quick like a stroke of thunder, mischievous to a flaw, unrepentantly light-fingered no matter how often Wanda made the point to scold him for having such nerve.

He was foolish, even childish at times, and yet Wanda loved him with an intensity that stretched far deeper in her very bones than any else she’d ever know—of that much, she was certain.

He believed there did not exist a single force in the land that might catch him, regardless of from whence it came—some days, even Wanda believed so, too.

He was wrong. _They_ were wrong.)

No—through Wanda’s purview, she was living on borrowed time (and had been for quite a while).

And, as those days (days that Wanda grew increasingly sure would be her penultimate ones) had come and gone… well. Things could certainly have been a great deal worse.

Her days went on something akin to this: wake with the rising sun in the servant’s quarters just a couple hundred paces from the castle, assist James (a fellow servant Wanda had grown rather close to in Windsor) with heating large basins of water for Prince Steven’s morning ritual, and eventually make her way up to the castle to greet Princess Natasha when she arose. 

Today was no exception. 

The fiery sun had risen high in the blue sky above by the time Wanda found herself knocking at the door of Princess Natasha’s located on the third aboveground floor in the east wing of the spacious castle, inexplicable nerves fluttering in her gut all the while—and it was little wonder as to why, no matter that she had been entrusted with Princess Natasha’s care since long before she can reasonably recall. 

Princess Natasha was… forever a sight to behold, even in the mornings ( _especially_ then, in Wanda’s humble opinion): face bare, forest-green eyes drooped with residual drowsiness, fiery red waves tumbling freely over smooth alabaster shoulders… Angelic, truly. 

“Enter,” comes Natasha’s quiet drawl through the wooden door, husky (more so than usual) from sleep. 

Wanda does, scarcely managing a murmured “Good day, Princess” without stuttering as she catches sight of the princess in question seated primly atop the edge of her unmade bed in a mess of sheets, the abundant beams of amber sunlight (streaming in through the many windows in her spacious quarters) appearing to set her naked form ablaze amidst the fleece-white bedsheets.

“How many times have I told you to call me 'Natasha’?” the woman muses as Wanda tentatively draws nearer, amusement clear upon her regal features. 

(She does not seem all that reticent at her own lack of clothing, especially when contrasted by Wanda’s modest dress—then again, she seldom ever does.)

Wanda feels her cheeks heat. “My apologies, Princ—"

The princess— _Natasha_ , Wanda mentally amends herself—raises a single well-shaped brow, effectively halting Wanda’s speech mid-flow. 

“… Natasha.”

“Marvelous,” the prin— _Natasha_ declares with a blinding grin, as if Wanda’s just accomplished something particularly rousing. (Wanda thinks she’ll never tire of that.) “Now, on to more pressing matters: I have found myself in something of a… predicament, if you will.”

Icy fear grips Wanda’s heart. “Have you been discovered?”

Natasha laughs, throaty and genuine. “No, sweet girl, nothing like unto that, I assure you,” she insists bemusedly, and Wanda feels her blush worsen at having been so incorrigibly presumptuous. (The term of endearment does not help matters all that much.) “It is just… Well. The lovely woman I selected for the previous night's supper never did appear, and I was unable to procure another willing mortal in order to sate my need before night fell. Thus, I must find another, and I would entreat you for your assistance in the matter, if you would be so inclined.”

Wanda thinks it over for a moment or two even whilst she feels the wispy ghost of an idea forming in her mind, one she is quite sure the pr— _Natasha_ —would not approve of… but still, she finds herself quite unable to keep from voicing it: “What about me?”

Natasha blinks, tilting her head ever-so-slightly to the side as she regards Wanda curiously. “Hm?”

“You… You could drink from me,” Wanda stammers out, blushing profusely all the while beneath the weight of Natasha’s gaze. 

Something unreadable flickers in those evergreen irises, something akin to interest (or maybe even _want_ ), yet Natasha’s subsequent rebuttal is firm: “Absolutely not.”

“Why?”

“Because I do not wish to see you hurt.”

Wanda fights to smile at the way her heart skips a beat upon hearing that. “But, Natasha, I… I can _help_ you. I _want_ to help you more desperately than anything.”

“No.”

“Why?” Wanda questions, frustration mounting in her chest along with a profound care that stretches far beyond her bounds, causing her to be exceedingly more liberal with her words in the presence of such royalty than she would dare to be otherwise. 

Natasha jaw clenches, and her next words are uttered so quietly Wanda finds herself straining in order to hear them. “Because I am invested personally in what becomes of you.”

“And I you,” Wanda replies in kind, her heart positively leaping in her chest.

“I would venture to say that you are missing the point I am attempting to make here, Wanda.”

“You are hungry,” Wanda reasons, attempting a different method—one that appeals to logic rather than emotion—in order to sway the stubborn princess. "You need blood, that which I have in abundance. I beg of you, Natasha—allow me this.”

Natasha worries her lower lip between her teeth, a stormy look upon her exalted features. “Allow you the chance to die by my hand?”

“You have far too little faith in yourself, Natasha.”

“And you have far too much.”

“All due respect, I do not think that is true."

There’s silence for a spell, then, until—

“This is madness,” Natasha snaps, agitation rising in her tone. "I would sooner starve.”

“You do not mean that.”

Natasha raises her chin stubbornly, fixing Wanda with a resolute stare. “I do.”

At that moment, Wanda makes a decision—perhaps not the most prudent one, but a clear-cut decision nonetheless, and before she can think better of it, she is detaching the thin metal clamp (one that had been her mother’s) from her hair, barely cognizant of the way it releases her long chestnut-brown locks to tumble wildly past her shoulders before bringing the dull points of the clip down to her wrist and—

Two cool hands closing firmly (yet gently) around either of her wrists stops her from pricking her skin—all of a sudden, Natasha is _there_ , her face a hair’s breadth from Wanda’s, green eyes filled with a profusion of emotion that sets Wanda’s body alight from the inside out.

“Stop,” Natasha whispers, voice low and rough, her nose brushing ever-so-gently against Wanda’s. “Please.”

Wanda can scarcely think, much less _breathe_ , even as she manages a murmured dissent: “But I—"

“No,” Natasha stops her, and she’s sure it is merely her imagination but she thinks Natasha draws even nearer to her then, the ambrosial flower-y scent of her pervading Wanda’s nostrils like the sweetest perfume. 

“But—"

Quite suddenly, she’s halted by a gentle yet entirely overwhelming sensation—the feeling of Natasha’s full lips pressed coolly against her own, her chilled grip loosening gradually around either of Wanda’s wrists, her pert nose brushing insistently against Wanda’s cheek. 

An all-encompassing warmth erupts in her chest, then, spreading like wildfire throughout her veins until it reaches from the crown of her skull to the very tips of her toes, her senses positively engulfed in Natasha, Natasha, _Natasha_. 

Natasha pulls back, then; it’s far too soon and Wanda can scarcely keep herself from chasing after her, desperate to feel it all over again: that indubitably wondrous sensation that Wanda fears she’s already become addicted to—she thinks that she will gladly spend the rest of her days chasing after it if only for the chance to know it once more, however remote it may be, and perhaps that should terrify her but it does not, it does _not_ ; it only exhilarates her further. 

“Do you understand now why I cannot let you do this?” Natasha questions, a breathless hint to her typically so self-assured voice that brings a bashful smile to Wanda’s face despite herself. “I could not fathom it if I lost you.”

“You will not,” Wanda assures her, just as breathless herself even as she leans in for another chaste kiss that (blessedly) Natasha allows; they melt into one another then without inhibition, lips pressed gently together like a promise Wanda prays will not ever break, a sort of consecrated finality misting over them all the while.

And, for the first time since the deaths of her beloved mother and brother, she prays to a god she is not quite sure she believes in that these days are not her last, that her time with Natasha has not reached its end—rather, that it is only just beginning. 

♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱ ♱

**Author's Note:**

> thots? 
> 
> here’s the link to my


End file.
